vydthuy

[vydthuy]

Final Portfolio Project - "Depth is a Language"

Shot on FUJIFILM-XT3

[vydthuy]

Artist Research Assignment

Cornelia Hediger Chosen Work:

Doppelganger I 2006, Photomontage:

Homage 2006: "The Annunciati on"

Cornelia Hediger is a New York based visual artist known for her unconventional and unique approaches to her photography. She makes these handmade photomontages and puts herself has the self-portraiture to express through her work. In her Homage to Otto Dix (2006), Cornelia Hediger reimagines classic Western art in her own personal, psychological way. She takes historical references and blends them with her own story, making something that feels both timeless and really intimate. Her Doppelgänger series from 2006 focuses more on identity, showing different versions of herself through fragmented, grid-like compositions. What I love about her work is how she blurs the line between photography and fine art, the way she stages everything and leaves the seams visible makes her images feel raw, emotional, and layered, just like the raw human experience.

I feel inspired by her work because of how honest and creative it feels. She’s not afraid to show all the different sides of herself , the strong parts, the vulnerable parts, and that makes her photography so easy to connect with. I love how she uses fragmentation, not just for how it looks, but to show what identity really feels like, layered, messy, and always changing. Through the way she mixes personal emotion, art history, and surreal spaces, she makes me want to use art to dig deeper into my own experiences and tell more real stories about how I see the world.

[vydthuy]

PART 2 - PASSAGE

This is a time that felt like me and my best friend were stepping into another symbolic moment of our lives together. We expressed this by opening the bracelet together and putting it on for each other as it was a very special bonding moment. Passage means to me a transitional period in your life where you are moving into a higher version of yourself. I would show passage through moving images by as filming our goals and dreams in this video as it shows that we are present in the moment for a conscious transformation. This is symbolic again as the bracelets become more than just jewelry it comes with significant intention. I did it differently with editing by, speeding it up and zooming in to my the content stimulating to watch, to put more emphasis. After watching the raw version I realized that I could again speed it up more, I can also further my ideas by putting sound effects next time. My process was going through the clips in the video to see what I had to cut out, zoom in or out and speed up. The final work changed by the editing had drastically improved the engagement of my video, to make the viewer feel like they are involved as well. I did not face any challenges yet, but it was a fun experience, looking back on the video!

[vydthuy]

BLOG - PROMPT PASSAGE

Passage is the a moment of movement like the energy has shifted, an awakening to trigger that transformation stage. How I express this was, this clip of me and my best friend opening our customized moldavite bracelet in the mail, I am an Aries and she is a Cancer, captures the deep change that is about to happen in our lives. As Moldavite is known to trigger deep change and align you to your highest timeline for your highest good. I am showing passage through the moving images by showing the memory in motion, one I can look back on as time passes. Opening the box it self represents passage as this symbolizes stepping into a new chapter, crossing a threshold. It is symbolic as we are laughing and our reactions, all authentic and raw, a symbol of youth, friendship, throughout time, as this is a more intentional approach. My inspiration goes as I go about my day but that day I was hanging out with her and I got the great idea to capture something so small but so memorable for us. My ideas did not change that much but it had made me reflect on the moment and I felt more grateful for it!

[vydthuy]

Art Event - Queer Representation | Comer Collection

My experience of the Queer Representation in the Comer Collection was amazing, I felt very connected to the art as I am also floating and queer. The first thing I notice about this picture is, it made me reflect on my identity a bit and who I am. The space felt diverse and accepting reflecting on how the community itself is. The event was one that was memorable as there were so many interesting pieces, but it all played together very well. One of the works that stood out to me was Kelli Connell, called Head-to-Head, archival Inkjet print, 2008, because the piece itself is very intimate, although it is the same person playing both figures, this is Kiba Jacobson. It unravels the deeper layer of self-exploration of sexuality and identity.

            What I think is going on with the work is there is this stillness in the photo like, these are the only two people in their own world. As the touching foreheads show, this sense of vulnerability and depth to it. The background is out of focus and the subjects are the main subject, clear, I also do not think anything was left out. I feel like the photographer stood close but zoomed into the lens on the subject. The source of light in this picture is natural lighting, I can tell by the background of the picture as it looks like a field in the back. I do not feel that this photograph is “objective,” neutral document of its subject, because every photograph reflects the choices made with the lighting, composition, perspective and it is subjective to me. The photograph is staged by the photographer since it is the same model for both of the subjects, the one thing that I noticed after looking at the photograph for several minutes is, how lost I got into it. This picture does remind me of what I experienced in my own life, with my past relationships. I feel like whoever resonates with this photograph on a soul level should see it, but I feel like everyone can see it if they want to or not. I would title this picture, “In a World: Full” because it feels like the picture is just their own world, although it is the same person, I feel like whenever you get to know yourself and your soul, you feel full. In a way that you are pouring into your cup and finding out who you are in this life journey. The mood shows off a gentle and mysterious, like there is something going on beneath the surface, but because it is the same person, it gives a sense of illusion or self-reflection moment. The tone is layered, fluid, and it is more about how the picture itself is presented. My initial reaction to the work was, “Wow, all of these pieces in such a space and this one made me feel like I was looking at just this one, and I stepped into an intimate world”.

            I think the artist’s intent was to explore sexuality, gender, identity, and photographer-sitter relationships. It challenges belief systems and the way society paints the LGBTQ community to be a certain way. I do think that the artist was successful in communicating these thoughts and concepts because the final image dives deep into an emotionally charged energy, as it made me self-reflect on my identity. The lighting as well, I feel like was executed in such a way that gets the viewers to connect deeper with the image. The two subjects are darker lighting, and the background is very bright, enhancing that closeness affect.        

            The work was super inspiring because I feel like it inspires viewers to embrace who they really are instead of conforming to societal expectations. The artist uses elements of composition with a purpose to deepen the emotional meaning, as the lines with the figures of both subjects head and noses align, to exude off that private feel. The texture is not too sharp or too refined, there is this softness to it, and the colors of it, being their shirts, a darker color again adds to that intimate feel, but the background of the grass being light green, gives an expansive energy to it. The work does reflect a cultural and social idea, as it does talk about how you perceive yourself and queerness. I do see a connection between subject matter and technique because the image itself takes a contemporary New Media stance, as there are layered nature of queer identity, as everything correlates well. In summary, the compositional choices convey the concept of what Connell was going for, to the line, space, texture, and colors. This piece is personal and intentional in the way it was received and delivered by the artist, which I see this as such a successful photograph.

[vydthuy]

BLOG PROMPT - Video Art

What is Video Art?

Video art is moving pictures in video technology, that can depict a story through this medium. Moving imagery differs from still by they add this element of time, sound, movement. The interpretation becomes more flexible as the moving imagery unravels, loops, or fragments. This makes the meaning change by on how long someone watches, what they are feeling when they watch it or what is it being displayed on.

In the video, "The Case for Video Art" it mentions Nam June Paik's Zen for Film (1964) challenging the viewer's expectations by then depicting a 30 minute of unprocessed 16mm film on a screen, as nothing but dudst and scratches. It makes the viewers relfect on the act of seeing itself, what is the meaning behind it? Then it mentions Joan Jonas's Vertical Roll (1972) using a rolling bar to split her body into disjointed fragments, challenging traditional portrayls of women. They both changed art by, Paik goes more into stillness and meditation while Jonas disrupts and uses fragmentation to express identity and tension. Both artist challenge the narrative on what art could be, as Paik more through minimalism and concepts, Jonas through performance and feminist commentary. I liked Jonas's piece as it had more of an emotional impact on me when I was looking at it, the piece made me reflect on why the media distorts bodies. I love Paik's work as well for how well innovative it is but the stillness did not hit me as deeply as Jonas's piece. Meanwhile the video, "Martha Rosler - Semiotics of the Kitchen 1975", uses deadpan performance and a list of kitchen utensils to subvert traditional female roles, then turning the tools into symbols of frustration and resistance, I found that super impactful as well. Overall, both works break the mold of putting video art into a stereotype or a box, as interpretation is never fixed, and meaning as it is always shifting with the viewer's awareness and engagement.

[vydthuy]

Blog Prompt - GIFS

Shot on FUJIFILM XT30

I had a great time learning this new skill in Photoshop! It was easier than I thought to make a fun GIF. The process is different by, the timelines that you can play with the speed of it and how more stimulating it is to look at. This affects motion by making it feel like the viewer is moving with the shot, like you can see the photographer's thought process more. This changes the interpretation of the photo by giving the viewers a bigger idea of what is actually happening in the photo. Overall, a very good excercise!

[vydthuy]

Blog Post - Midterm Project

Shot on FUJIFILM XT30

Artist Statement:

For my ideas, I was thinking of doing something spiritual and outerly world like, but still some presence with nature. So I went on pinterest and started to look for inspiration and the beach, the water, and the lights that were in the photo really intrigued me. So then I took photos of my friend and cut her out, her outfit was very ethreal and that was the theme I was wanting to go for, for this midterm.

I used different blue gradients on the gradient map, also darkening the contrast and brightness level. But for my subject I made her glow more so she can pop out more. With this midterm I wanted to depict a woman going on her soul journey throughout life to find herself, in the process of this journey she gets to know herself more everyday, because we as humans are constantly evolving and ever changing.

[vydthuy]

Inprogress Midterm Update:

What is working right now is the concept going how I envisioned it to, very altered reality like. I also love how the editing is turning out pretty well. I do not have anything that isn’t going well so far, but usually if that happens I just try to learn from it rather than focusing if it doesn’t look a certain way.

[vydthuy]

Blog Prompt - Ai In Photography

The approaches to the art making

Ai is artificial intelligence that can generate anything you tell it to as it is programmed to manipulate through the systems to make automatic images or anything else you program it to.

I have tried AI in my photography to experiment because it is always good to try things at least once, to gain knowledge and learn from it! It is always good to open your perspective as the world is always evolving. I was messing around on Photoshop and you can pick a spot and put in a word and it can generate what word you put in, it is like a surprise in itself!

I see AI affecting and changing photography by giving artists the chance to make their craft more flexible in terms of what they can create. I feel like it opens up a whole new realm, and even medium towards the art-techno world. I agree with these opinions because I feel that it can bring more inspiration to artists and the viewers. Like it mentioned in the article, "How Will AI Transform Photography?", Engman's AI work pushed more of his ideas further as he was able to articulate bodily movement, like how I mentioned earlier that artists have more freedom. This article talks about how AI is changing photography and art in general, having new innovations, that give artists to do so.

As for "Ai isn't a threat", when it was said, "One is writing with light, one if writing with promopts. They are connected... but now AI has a life of its own" I agree with this as well because this is a whole new spectrum of it's own to be explored. For copyright it is in the gray area as it depends on the situation, as many AI are trained on already existing artwork, but it is important to use from an AI that is non-copyrighted and has right of use as an artist. This article talks about how Eldagsen believes that AI should be a tool for artist to use.

For the video, "Photography vs AI" it goes in depth on how AI impacts photography, with the comparisons, and challenges it might bring. This video depicts how important it is using the AI's benefits ethically and photography with a good balance.

[vydthuy]

BLOG PROMPT - Surrealism

What I learned about surrealism is that it is anything beyond reality, art work that is unconventional, and unexpected. Surrealism was also seen in dramas, literature, poetry, and paintings back then. The artist that stuck out to me was Man Ray, he is a visual artist and member of the DADA. The artwork of the lips in the sky is very trippy but cool, it kind of looks like someones face and not the sky. I remember in the video that was assigned, that he did experimental photography and his rayographs were so interesting.

[vydthuy]

BLOG PROMPT - TRIPTYCH

Shot on FUJIFILM XT30

Dark Lighting

I took 3 photos to make these triptychs, I was playing around with light painting, and played with the warp tool with the left and right photo to make it look interesting. I was challenging perspective by warp it into a transformative flow, something that is unexpected, but also makes you question what you are looking at, like you can get lost in the photos. The two photos that surround the middle one pulls you into the main photo, make it feel expansive. It is truthful, but also keeps you wondering, what the depths of this could be. I am challenging this documentation, by keeping my approach unconventional. I played around and combined the top photo and the last photo together to make the middle photo, I found that the x-ray option was very interesting, I then played with the levels, brightness, contrast, curves, and then put it in lightroom to add color and play around with the blues, as the textures, and dehazing also intriguied me to experiment around.

[vydthuy]

BLOG PROMPT - GLITCH

These are new photos that I used to edit, I took a photo of my friend holding flowers. I used halfone pattern for both photos, used lines, upped the contrast so the lines can stand out more, and layered them on top of the photo itself. I played with the curves, exlcusion, divide, hard mix, subtract, and opacity. For the glitching lines on the top layer, I made the rectangles as big and long to my liking and moved it around a bit for the composition. Playing around with black and white as well.

For the yellow and green touches, it is disgusied as flowers and I played with the opacity of that as well. In the second photo I duplicated her another time to add another glitchy effect. Both photos I also added noise. I changed the meaning of the photo by making it more abstract and dream-like with a techno like feel blend. I loved playing with the highlights and experimenting around with different styles. I feel like this makes the pieces more detailed and complex to determine how the viewers can interpret the meaning of it. The lines can represent how guarded someone can feel in the admist of dealing with their feelings, that can feel quite complex, detached, but also illusive to what was real and what once was.

[vydthuy]

Response - Artists in Glitch

Elena Kulikova

The first thing that stood out to me was that her photography is very dreamy, allusive, but it draws you in. There is something magnetic about the way she edits and frames her subjects along with the great lighting that she does. It seems so simple, but I see the complexities in it with the intentions that she puts into her photography, as well as the expressions of the models being super important to portray her message. The way she sets up and positions her subjects in the photos is eye-catching to me, it doesn’t seem too overwhelming, but it gives you that spark and curiosity in thinking what is going on in the pictures. Overall, I love the abstract, and fragmented compositions that she uses in her artwork, it shows various experimental techniques.

Heitor Magno

Heitor Magno’s artwork has so much surrealism in it, with intense emotions conveyed, and dystopian glitches. There is something so complex, but so detailed oriented about his work, it is aweing. I am so impressed, you can see how much hard work he puts into his artwork, and how much thought he puts behind it. Then I see a lot of techno styles blended with the human like bodies, which makes a contrast. In conclusion, his artwork portrays great digital manipulation, ethereal, and ghostly subjects that stand out in the art scene.

[vydthuy]

Blog Prompt 4 - Photomontage

The conceptual intention of this photomontage was to push the boundaries of artistic consistency along with, what is real and what is an illusion in a photo. The transformation of this, I tried to emphasize a blend of distortion, surreal, and abstract elements. Going about a dream-like disorientation, with high contrast and many overlapping layers. I am trying to convey my quirky and unconventional side, more then my structured and consistent approach when I do my photography, this gives me a chance to explore within the freedom of art. The swirl in the middle, shows how unpredictable my mind can be sometimes with the random chicken feet all around, sometimes it is good to let loose then be in control of everything. I am including symbolism by showing a food that is heavily apart of my culture, where it brings people together to bond and eat. The cute little bear and crochet flower girl, shows my fun and playful side of me. Then the dissolving crystals to show the taboo interests that I have when people get to know me deeper. Overall, this explores a lot of texture, color, and shows the illusions through the depths of my thinking.

I used the liquifying filter, with the magic wand to cut out the elements in my visual identity photos. I experimented with a lot of curves and photo filters available on Photoshop. I also used subtract, linear dodge, linear light, pin light, hard light, divide, hard mix, overlay, and messing with the opacity on the objects. Flipping objects around to add to that illusion affect. All of these images are used from my visual identity photos. I found these filters very successful as it shows, yes some consistency in the neutral, muted colors, but inconsistency in the high contrast cut outs added on. I found the assortion of the placements a bit challenging, but I tried to just let loose and go with my intuition with this photomontage.

[vydthuy]

Reading 2 - DADA & Photomontage

Dada is an art movement that was brought up in a little nightclub named Cabaret Volitaire in Zurich Switzerland, this was mentioned in the, "Dadaism in 8 Minutes: Can Everything Be Art?" video. A group of artists moved to neutral Switzerland and formed a new artistic group called, DADA. It was sought as an anti-art movement that went agaist traditional artistic values, it embraced chaos and randomness in a way with all of the societial structures in place that was causing destruction around the time.

The movement went against the rules and paved their own way of ideals, as they aimed to destroy what was thought of as acceptable.

At the core of Dada artists' beliefs or motivations were a rejection of societial norms and tradition, using what was normal to go against and critique war, politics and establishments.

They expressed these ideas by creating art like photomontages, ready-mades, out of the ordinary art, and satire, rejecting artist rules and logic.

I see DADA's influence today by it breaking the boundaries of art, opening up new avenues of mediums, challenging what society defines as art, and the irony to critique modern issues.

The first DADA artist that was presented, was German artist Hannah Hoch, mentioned in the first video, "Cut with the Kitchen Knife". Hannah pushed boundaries in art, hence breaking rules by capturing the political chaos during that time, cutting a swath and putting the pieces to put things back together. She was focusing on fragmentation as defining culture in that moment of time, as this reinvented photography through photomontaging, from magazines, mass media, and more. Her work also addressed issues towards gender inequality, as it was shown in "Cut with the Kitchen Knife, including photos of independent women while putting awareness on underaddressed ideals of feminity. Her meaning in imagery was to highlight the chaos and contradictions of post-World War 1, political corruption, and gender roles. Her symbolism had a lot of women, emphasizing instability of the post war era, and politics.

The second DADA artist that stood out to me was, French-born Picabia, a highly versatile artist, mentioned in, "What is Dada? Art Movements & Styles". His work with cubism and impressionism became very known through the New York DADA group, and loved the paradox, unconventionality, and abusurdity. His always changing and approach to art impacted surrealism and post modernism. There was a reject of artistic consistency in his work, manipulation in the images, these reasons pushing the boundaries of art and photography. His meaning in imagery was the unconventional forms to critique industrialization and authority. His symbolism had a lot of abstract forms and exploring the unconscious.

The third DADA artist is Man Ray, an artist that makes art with whatever was lying around his studio. He pushed the boundaries by going out of the ordinary like the other artists mentioned by in his own way by using photography and making evocative pictures of ordinary objects. In a way his art sent a message of questioning what is art really in it's essence or purpose? He was mentioned in, "Crimes against Photography": Man Ray and the Rayograph" video, when a mistake had happened in the darkroom, the photographs had came out mysteriously stunning to him and this came to be the Rayograph later on. This challenged photography by it was photographs made without a camera and just objects, disrupting the reality of it. His meaning in imagery was with a blend of surrealism to challnege tradtional representations, to invite the viewer to question, what is real and what is not. His symbolism often had dream-like feel to them, playing with illusions.

[vydthuy]

Blog Prompt 4 - Paying Attention to Light

Shot on FujiFilm X-T30, 6:40AM

F 2.8 ISO 160 Shutter Speed 2

Shot on FujiFilm X-T30, 2:33PM

F 18 ISO 320 Shutter Speed 15

Shot on FujiFilm X-T30, 7:05PM

F 2.8 ISO 160 Shutter Speed 4

The first picture's lighting was dark like the natural light of the sun hasn't come out yet, but about to later. This affected the color by making the object more reflective, also with the rain outside, since it was out on my balcony. My settings are similar to the rest but kept it low because it was hard to capture the lighting of the object so it wouldn't be so dark in the photo.

The second picture's lighting is a bright but soft lighting on the object. This affected the color by see the gradients of the object that holds the crystals more, but not as much detail as the first picture. I upped the F stop because the lighting was much brighter outside, so it doesn't get overexposed.

The third picture's lighting is slightly dark, but there is still lighting out because the moon was out. This affected the color by still seeing the object reflective, but seeing the gradient of the color, it wasn't too overexposed compared to the second photo.